Southwest Minnesota State 70 Wayne State 69

            A furious comeback fell one point short as the Wayne State men nearly rallied from a 21-point deficit early in the second half as the Wildcats suffered a heartbreaking 70-69 Northern Sun Conference men's basketball loss at Southwest Minnesota State in Marshall, Minnesota Wednesday evening.  The Wildcats fall to 12-14 overall and 9-10 in the NSIC while SMSU improves to 14-11 on the season and 9-10 in league play.

            The host Mustangs started the game on fire, making their first eight shots and 10 of their first 15 shots to take a 23-6 lead with 9:36 to play in the first half.  Southwest Minnesota State eventually took a 20 point lead in the first half at 38-18 and led 38-20 at halftime.

            SMSU opened the second half with a three pointer by Kevin Andrews to take their biggest lead of the game at 41-20.  The Wildcats slowly began chipping away at the Mustang lead and got the lead down to single digits at 47-39 on a Jason Jensen layup with 12:04 to play.  WSC got within five points at 51-46 on a Jason Jensen trey with 8:09 to play, but SMSU came back and held a 10 point lead at 61-51 with 4:23 remaining before WSC made one more comeback.

            WSC still trailed 68-61 with 1:27 left following a Jordan Miller three pointer for SMSU.  Jason Jensen countered with a three to cut the Mustang lead to four at 68-64 with 1:11 to play.  The Mustangs used a pair of Scott Roehl free throws with 38 seconds left to lead 70-64. Amry Shelby made a pair of free throws with 28 seconds remaining to make the score 70-66 following a technical foul on SMSU's Scott Roehl.  WSC then used a Brad Starken layup and free throw to cut the Mustang lead to one at 70-69 with 25 seconds left.

            Without any timeouts, WSC had to foul Southwest Minnesota State and the strategy worked in the 'Cats favor as Trent Carlson missed two free throws giving WSC the ball.  Jason Jensen missed a jumper with 10 seconds left and the Wildcats had to foul SMSU's Jordan Miller, who missed two free throws with seven seconds left.  WSC drove the ball down the floor and a three pointer by Jensen was no good as time expired allowing Southwest Minnesota State to escape with the 70-69 win.

            Freshman guard Amry Shelby led WSC in scoring with a game-high 18 points followed by Jason Jensen with 15.  Brad Starken added 13 points with Brett Spiker contributing 11.  The Wildcats finished the game shooting 23 of 45 from the field for 51 percent, making 5 of 13 behind the three point line.  WSC was 18 of 21 (85.7%) at the free throw line.

            Jordan Miller led Southwest Minnesota State with 16 points followed by Trent Carlson's 14 points.  Kevin Andrews finished with 13 points while Scott Roehl chipped in 11 points and 11 rebounds.  The Mustangs shot 26 of 48 for the game (54.2%) and was 10 of 17 behind the three point line while making just 8 of 16 free throws.

            The Mustangs outrebounded Wayne State 25-22 thanks to 11 caroms by Roehl while Wayne State's top rebounder was Brett Spiker with six.  SMSU had 14 turnovers to 11 for Wayne State.

            The Wildcats will be at home on Saturday night hosting Bemidji State in the regular season finale on Senior Night at Rice Auditorium starting at 6:00 p.m.